Finance & Assurance Specialist

Job Description

Finance & Assurance Specialist Permanent London (EC1R) with remote working £41,298 per annum Ful Time - 35 hours per weekMorgan Hunt are working with a well-established Charity who are currently recruiting for a Finance and Assurance Specialist to join their team on a Full Time, Permanent basis. At the moment, you will only be required to attend the London Office for meetingsor once a quarter with the rest of the team. However, this is under review and is subject to change.Responsibilities:Your duties and responsibilities as a Finance and Assurance Specialist will include:

• Work closely with the Finance and Assurance Manager to implement best practices for financial management, standard operating procedures for financial processes, donor compliance, Management of grants and contracts develop financial templates, ensuring thatAAUK policies and procedures meet donor compliance requirements and are being followed internally
• Provide expertise and advice on institutional donors financial regulations, compliance requirements and templates on low-medium risk projects
• Work closely with Programme Quality and Assurance Specialists and Managers in AAUK, and programme management and finance teams to provide advice on best practices for financial management of grants, review financial reports, budget revisions and providefeedback and comments, for UK donors
• Support Programme Quality and Assurance Specialists and Managers to review income and expenditure monthly reports, to ensure that all institutional income and expenditure are recorded correctly in the Annual Accounts and according to donor requirementson low-medium risk projects
• Support on audits, preparing and managing the annual process when needed
• Support designing and delivering training / capacity building during inception workshops, monitoring visits, grant closure workshops
• Support BD and PQA colleagues with tracking, uploading and updating finance data on the Contract Management System, as per Standard Operating Procedures and guidance and training provided
• Support to strengthen the capacity and capability of UK teams and team members in other countries, ensuring that financial management is a key element of accountability and donor compliance
• Provide orientation, technical training and support in order to build greater team understanding, capability and capacity for financial management at project and team level
• Provide financial information as needed to internal reporting processes
• Provide expertise and advice to teams on institutional donors financial regulations, compliance requirements and templates, and to support colleagues to manage financial and compliance issues in low risk donor relationships and grants
• Work closely with Business Development Specialists and Senior Specialists during proposal development and lead on financial and compliance aspects for all low-medium risk proposals, ensuring that key risks in these areas are effectively managed, that anyemerging issues are proactively identified and resolved, and assisting with negotiations and agreement of contract amendments with donors as required
• Lead the review of low-medium risk proposals to ensure they are in the best interests financially and that contractual commitments made to donors are realistic and feasible (at UK and Federation Member level)
• Lead or support the development of commercial proposals for commercial contract bids to ensure they are in organisations the best interests financially and that contractual commitments made to donors are realistic and feasible (at UK and Federation Memberlevel)
• Ensure that funding recipients have appropriate systems to fulfil the internal and external reporting and compliance obligations
• Provide accurate and timely information on specific donor contractual, reporting and proposal requirements within all agreed deadlines
• Design and deliver training / capacity building material for grant proposals and tenders in order to build greater team understanding, capability and capacity for financial management and budget development at UK and country level.
• Work in collaboration with the Finance and Assurance Manager in International Development Policy and Practice and the Finance Department at AAUK, to encourage cross departmental information and knowledge sharing within ActionAid, both in the UK and internationally

Requirements:

• Demonstrable financial management experience, including managing grants
• Demonstrable knowledge of a variety of institutional donor rules, financial control procedures and risk management
• Good knowledge of project cycle management, contract management and logical frameworks
• Demonstrable experience in budget preparation and analysis, financial reporting and audit preparation
• Proven ability to translate technical financial data into informative reports for non-finance staff
• Proven facilitation, training and capacity building skills, ideally in supporting partners or colleagues overseas
• Proven ability to implement and improve financial processes with reference to internal and external stakeholders
• Excellent Excel skills
• Ability to work well in a team and cross-organisationally, establishing excellent relationships with colleagues from different functions and cultures
• Strong communicator, both verbally and in written form
• Ability to think and work proactively and creatively under pressure or when faced with competing demands
• Good understanding of international development issues
• Ability to travel overseas, often to insecure environments for short periods of time

Desirable:

• Accountancy or Audit qualification / accounting degree
• Previously worked with DFID, the European Commission, Comic Relief, the Big Lottery Fund, Peoples Postcode Lottery Fund, or Amplify Change
• Supported in bid development processes and managing commercial contracts

Morgan Hunt is a multi-award-winning recruitment business for interim, contract and temporary recruitment and acts as an Employment Agency in relation to permanent vacancies. Morgan Hunt is an equal opportunities employer. Job suitability is assessed onmerit in accordance with the individuals skills, qualifications and abilities to perform the relevant duties required in a particular role.